Esther

As we begin this morning, would you please turn in your copies of God’s Word to the Book of Esther. If you are using the pew Bibles, you will find it on page 354. We will read the first 8 verses shortly, so please have them marked and ready for that time.

This morning we take a brief break from our time in the Book of Ezra to look at the Old Testament book of Esther. Historically the book of Esther fits between chapter 6 and chapter 7 of Ezra and since we just finished chapter 6, I thought this would be a good time to look at Esther.

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Timeline

In looking at the timeline on the projector as well as in your bulletins, you can see where it neatly fits between the 2 sections of Ezra. You may want to keep that timeline handy in your copy of God’s Word, as we continue through Ezra, Esther and Nehemiah. That way you can keep track of the timeframe of what is taking place. It kinda gives you a picture of the history of these key events.

Esther is really an incredible book that I believe can provide a great source of encouragement for each of us. There are many important lessons in Esther, but 2 that I found just seemed to jump off of the page for me, first was the providential sovereignty of God, the fact that God is completely in control of this world He created. The second is the fact that His timing is absolutely perfect. I will readily admit that there are times when I am not a fan of His timing, but much of the time over the course of time, I have discovered that His timing is always perfect. That is the book in a nutshell, but we will look at these truths in more detail later.

As we start our journey through Esther, I want to introduce you to the 5 main characters in Esther, give you a brief history lesson of what was taking place leading up to and including the time of Esther and look at part of the first 2 chapters.

To begin with, Esther is one of only 2 books in the Bible that do not mention God, the other being Song of Solomon. There is also no mention of worship, prayer or sacrifice in the book of Esther. Yet the book of Esther is masterfully written in such a way that although God is never mentioned by name, He is the unquestioned theme of every page, in fact it appears the author deliberately refrained from mentioning God or any religious activities as a literary device to heighten the fact that it is God Who controls and directs all the seemingly insignificant coincidences to bring about His perfect plan.

We also do not know for certain who the authored the Book of Esther. What we do know is that whoever wrote it was both an expert on Jewish as well as Persian culture. Most likely a Jew that was raised in Babylon. Could be Ezra, Nehemiah or Mordecai, but no one knows for certain.

Let’s look at the 5 leading characters of the book. As we do, I do want to point out that much of what we know concerning most of these 5 leading characters, do not come from the pages of God’s Word, they come from the pages of recorded history. They are not a part of the inspired Word of God, but are widely accepted by both secular as well as Biblical historians. To start with we have:

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Character #1-Xerxes/Ahasuerus- Esther 1

Xerxes was the son of Darius who we were introduced to a couple weeks ago. Xerxes had a furious temper as we will see in the first chapter. Historians tell us that there was a time when he was getting ready to do battle against Greece. On the way to Greece, he came upon a large body of water to cross, part of the Black Sea. He had his army build a bridge across, but before they could cross a violent storm blew in and destroyed the bridge. Xerxes was furious that the storm had destroyed the bridge they built. He thought that the designs by the engineers were inadequate, so he gathered all the engineers together and chopped their heads off. But he was also furious with the water, so he sent soldiers into the water with whips demanding that they lash the ocean 300 times for its insubordination. And then he sent soldiers in and they threw shackles into the water to bind the water and to stab the waves with red-hot irons. He was a man with an irrational rage.

There is one other event from his life that I want to add that comes into play in the events of chapter 1. As they prepared to head to Greece to do battle, one of his officials approached him with a special request. This official had 5 sons who were all getting ready to head to Greece. The official requested that his 4 youngest sons accompany Xerxes to the the battlefield, but he asked that his oldest son remain behind to care for him, his remaining family, property and possessions. Xerxes was livid at the request. He reminded the official that as the king, he himself was heading to battle, and this man had the nerve to ask that one of his sons remain behind! I guess you could say he did let the oldest son stay behind, although it was in 2 pieces. He had the oldest son cut in half, placed one half on one side of the road, the other half on the other side of the road, then he proceeded to march his massive army on the road between the 2 halves of the eldest son, delivering a vivid and clear message to the entire army. Keep this story in mind as we move forward.

Needless to say, his rage is on full display in Esther chapter 1.

The next character in the story is: Next Slides

Character #2-Queen Vashti

Esther 1: 10, 11, 12, 15

Some historians believe that Queen Vashti was the great granddaughter of King Nebuchadnezzer, if so, her father would have been the last Babylonian King, King Belshazzar. He was the king when Cyrus conquered Babylon. You can find more about him by reading the Biblical account in Daniel 5. According to the Jewish Midrash she was wicked and vain. Jewish historians also portray her with a hatred for the Jewish people, so much so that she often would require her Jewish servant girls to not only work on their Sabbath, but also work minus any clothes. Keep that in your memory banks as we get to chapter 1.

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Character #3-Haman

Esther 3:1-10; chapter 8, chapter 9; Duet. 25; 1 Samuel 15

Now if you have watched the movie Aladdin, you have an idea of the role Haman played in the Persian empire, he has the same role as Jafar had in Aladdin. He was 2nd in command to the king.

According to John MacArthur-This is a man who had been exalted by the king, a capable man, a Persian man, a man who had been lifted up above other princes and other royal officials. But there’s something very interesting about this man and this is key to the whole story. He was an Agagite, It says that in 3:1-10; it says it again in chapter 8; says it again in chapter 9, it says, “Haman, the Agagite...Haman the Agagite.” It keeps repeating that. That’s not a small detail. It is the origin of Haman’s hatred that we will see that he has for Mordecai and his hatred for the Jews.

To understand why it’s important to know that he was an Agagite, let’s go back a little bit. Let’s go back a thousand years, or almost a thousand years, to the Exodus from Egypt. The Israelites come out of Egypt around 1445 B.C., so were about nearly a thousand years before. And they’re attacked in the seventeenth chapter of Exodus by the Amalekites, remember that name? The Amalekites attacked them. The Amalekites are descendants of Esau, the one who sold his birthright to his brother Jacob. Because the Amalekites attacked the Jews, God curses the Amalekites and God’s curse in Deuteronomy 25 says, “One day they’re going to be extinct.” God pronounces a curse on the Amalekites. God, the God of Israel, pronounces a curse on the Amalekites.

Four centuries later, King Saul conquers the Amalekites—you remember the story in 1 Samuel—and he captures their king and his name is Agag, the Amalekite king. Saul was supposed to kill Agag; he didn’t do it. He let him live. And Saul incurred the Lord’s displeasure, and for that and for other things that he did that displeased the Lord the throne was removed from his family. Since Saul refused to put him to death, the prophet Samuel stepped in. And you remember what the prophet Samuel did with Agag? First Samuel 15, “He hacked him to pieces.” Haman was an Agagite. And though almost a millennium had passed since the curse, and hundreds of years had passed since the hacking of Agag to death, Haman knew his family history and he knew that it was a Jewish man, a Jewish prophet by the name of Samuel, who had hacked his royal ancestor to pieces. (John MacArthur)He hated the Jews with a passion.

That brings us the the next character: Next Slides

Character #4-Mordecai Esther 2:5; 19-23; chapter 3

Mordecai is a Jew and a descendant of Kish, we read that in chapter 2, verse 5. Kish is from the tribe of Benjamin, and Benjamin is the line of Saul. Haman and Mordecai knew their history. There was deep-seeded animosity between the descendants of Saul and the descendants of Agag for obvious reasons. And though nearly...What?...550 years had passed, both Haman and Mordecai—Haman the Agagite, Mordecai the Benjamite—had not forgotten the tribal feud that was so ancient. We will see this feud come to the forefront in chapter 3.

This brings us to the last main character of the book: Next Slides

Character #5-Esther

Esther is the heroine of the book. A beautiful Jewish woman probably in her early 20’s. She is an orphan and had been raised by her older cousin Mordecai since the death of her parents, in many ways he was like a father to her. We will look more at her a little bit later.

For now, let me take you back again in history. Let’s go back in history to 490 BC. At the time Darius is the Ruler of the massive Persian Empire. A constant thorn in his side for much of his reign was the rebel forces of Greece. They had already been conquered, but they rebelled over and over again. So Darius assembled an army that ancient sources estimated to be about 1 million soldiers, to once and for all put down a revolt from the once conquered Greeks. In this instance the Greeks used their knowledge of their own land to outsmart Darius and his army and handed him a defeat in the famous battle of Marathon. Darius promised to avenge the loss but died before he had a chance to make good on his promise. Before his death in 486 BC, he made his son Xerxes promise to finish the task.

It took a few years for Xerxes to get things set to make good on his promise, but finally in 483 BC he assembled an army of as many as 2 million to exact the revenge. This is the battle we spoke about earlier this morning in looking at King Xerxes. At any rate, before heading to Greece, King Xerxes calls a 6 month military summit to set the strategy for the battle. This is where the book of Esther begins.

With that as an introduction, let’s look at the first 8 verses. Would you please stand, in honor of the reading of God’s Word? Next Slides

Esther 1:1–8 NASB95

1 Now it took place in the days of Ahasuerus, the Ahasuerus who reigned from India to Ethiopia over 127 provinces, 2 in those days as King Ahasuerus sat on his royal throne which was at the citadel in Susa, 3 in the third year of his reign he gave a banquet for all his princes and attendants, the army officers of Persia and Media, the nobles and the princes of his provinces being in his presence. 4 And he displayed the riches of his royal glory and the splendor of his great majesty for many days, 180 days. 5 When these days were completed, the king gave a banquet lasting seven days for all the people who were present at the citadel in Susa, from the greatest to the least, in the court of the garden of the king’s palace. 6 There were hangings of fine white and violet linen held by cords of fine purple linen on silver rings and marble columns, and couches of gold and silver on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother-of-pearl and precious stones. 7 Drinks were served in golden vessels of various kinds, and the royal wine was plentiful according to the king’s bounty. 8 The drinking was done according to the law, there was no compulsion, for so the king had given orders to each official of his household that he should do according to the desires of each person.

May the Lord add His blessing to the reading of His Word, please be seated.

So Xerxes ends the 180 day summit with a spectacular 7 day feast where alcohol and food flowed without limits.

According to verse 9 Queen Vashti was also giving a lavish feast, her’s took place in the palace.

Legend, in other words, this is not completely verifiable, but legend tells us that on the 7th and last day of the banquet, some of the leaders began to argue about who had the most beautiful women in the empire. Some argued that the most beautiful women were the Medes, others argued the most beautiful women were the Persians. Legend tells us that the garden where this banquet was taking place fell silent when King Xerxes began to speak. He said that his Chaldean wife was more beautiful than all of them. At that, one of the other leaders challenged him to prove his words. Not willing to back down, King Xerxes asked them if they wanted him to bring Queen Vashti in for all to see.

Now let’s pause for a moment and remind ourselves what they have been doing the last 7 days, for the past 7 days they have been drinking in excess, most of them were in a state of constant drunkeness and truthfully, the abuse of alcohol, or any other substance which can impair a person, can get a person to do things they would never do any other time. The legend continues that in their drunkeness they told the King that they were only interested in seeing the queen if she was wearing nothing but her crown, and in his drunkeness he agreed.

Keep in mind that she herself is the daughter of a King, not only a daughter of a King, but also one who in an effort to humiliate Jewish women would make them work on their Sabbath without clothes. She wasn’t about to be humiliated in that way and as a result we read in verse 12 Next Slide

Esther 1:12 ESV

12 But Queen Vashti refused to come at the king’s command delivered by the eunuchs. At this the king became enraged, and his anger burned within him.

What happened next is one of the key lessons for us this morning, and that lesson is: Next Slides

Be very carful where you go to seek council.

In this instance, a drunken King sought council from the drunken men he had surrounded himself with. Let’s look at their advice to him: Next Slides

Esther 1:13–22 NASB95

13 Then the king said to the wise men who understood the times—for it was the custom of the king so to speak before all who knew law and justice 14 and were close to him: Carshena, Shethar, Admatha, Tarshish, Meres, Marsena and Memucan, the seven princes of Persia and Media who had access to the king’s presence and sat in the first place in the kingdom— 15 “According to law, what is to be done with Queen Vashti, because she did not obey the command of King Ahasuerus delivered by the eunuchs?” 16 In the presence of the king and the princes, Memucan said, “Queen Vashti has wronged not only the king but also all the princes and all the peoples who are in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus. 17 “For the queen’s conduct will become known to all the women causing them to look with contempt on their husbands by saying, ‘King Ahasuerus commanded Queen Vashti to be brought in to his presence, but she did not come.’ 18 “This day the ladies of Persia and Media who have heard of the queen’s conduct will speak in the same way to all the king’s princes, and there will be plenty of contempt and anger. 19 “If it pleases the king, let a royal edict be issued by him and let it be written in the laws of Persia and Media so that it cannot be repealed, that Vashti may no longer come into the presence of King Ahasuerus, and let the king give her royal position to another who is more worthy than she. 20 “When the king’s edict which he will make is heard throughout all his kingdom, great as it is, then all women will give honor to their husbands, great and small.” 21 This word pleased the king and the princes, and the king did as Memucan proposed. 22 So he sent letters to all the king’s provinces, to each province according to its script and to every people according to their language, that every man should be the master in his own house and the one who speaks in the language of his own people.

This is an important lesson for us. As followers of Christ, we should be seeking council from Godly proven people, especially when it comes to the important decisions that can have a key affect on our future.

The next key lesson for us this morning is: Next Slides

Be careful making hasty decisions.

We see this in Esther 1:19: Next Slide

Esther 1:19 ESV

19 If it please the king, let a royal order go out from him, and let it be written among the laws of the Persians and the Medes so that it may not be repealed, that Vashti is never again to come before King Ahasuerus. And let the king give her royal position to another who is better than she.

Again, keep in mind that these men are drunk, and here they are making a quick and emotional decision. In this instance, once this decision was made, there was no turning back.

The same thing can happen to us and that is why we need to slow down, pray, seek council of proven Godly leaders before we make major decisions in life.

That brings us to another key lesson this morning, I kind of alluded to it earlier, but I want to look at it a little closer now. That lesson is this: Next Slides

Be careful what you do under the influence of alcohol.

Now right now I am kind of reading between the lines for a moment. My father used to call this Canadiology. In other words this isn’t exactly Scripture, but I believe it is accurate.

It is my belief that Xerxes loved Queen Vashti, and that what he told her to do while drunk was something he would have never dreamed of doing while sober. The reason I believe he actually loved her is this, he didn’t have her executed on the spot. He was the king of the most powerful nation on the face of the earth, and she had refused his direct order.

Do you remember what he did to the engineers that designed the bridge that collapsed in the storm? He had their heads cut off! Do you remember what he did the the oldest son of the official, who the official asked to be excused from battle against Greece? Xerxes was not a rational man, yet he didn’t have Vashti killed. I think it was because he loved her but he realized when it was too late that he had made a huge mistake while drunk.

If your going to be controlled by anything, don’t let it be alcohol or anything else them impairs your judgement. Paul makes that clear for us in Eph. 5:18 where we read: Next Slide

Ephesians 5:18

Ephesians 5:18 ESV

18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit,

Let’s stop here this morning and we will pick up in chapter 2 next week.

So the key lessons for us this morning.

1st. and we will get a more detailed look at this as we go through Esther, but God is absolutely in control of all things, we can trust Him at all times.

2nd. And this is also something we will see more of later in Esther, and that is, God’s timing is always perfect, even when it doesn’t seem perfect to us at the time.

3rd. Be very carful where you go to seek council. Especially when it comes to the major decisions of life, seek council from proven Godly leaders.

4th. Be careful making hasty decisions. Again, especially when it comes to the major decisions in life, take your time, pray, consult the Scriptures, and seek council from proven Godly leaders.

5th. Be careful what you do under the influence of alcohol, or anything else that may in your judgement.

Let’s close in prayer.

Beenediction:

Isaiah 45:7–9 NASB95

7 The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these. 8 “Drip down, O heavens, from above, And let the clouds pour down righteousness; Let the earth open up and salvation bear fruit, And righteousness spring up with it. I, the Lord, have created it. 9 “Woe to the one who quarrels with his Maker— An earthenware vessel among the vessels of earth! Will the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you doing?’ Or the thing you are making say, ‘He has no hands’?